Tom Waits - VH-1 Storytellers, Burbank Airport, Los Angeles, CA, 4-1-1999

The "VH-1 Storytellers" flood continues with an episode featuring singer-songwriter Tom Waits.

I have conflicted opinions about Waits. On one hand, I really don't like his voice, which I feel is part of a deliberately constructed persona where he's trying to be a character in a Charles Bukowski novel. But on the other hand, I can't deny he's a talented songwriter, and I enjoy his songs when other people sing them. Given that, I wasn't really looking forward to prepping this album. But it was better than I'd expected. A big part of that is there's a lot of banter, and his talking is entertaining without the singing vocals problem I have with him.

One nice thing about the Storytellers album is that the episodes were typically only about 45 minutes long, but a good portion of them are bootlegs that are a lot longer. This is one such case. The soundboard bootleg I found was nearly two hours long, but I cut out a little bit of dead air here and there. I also removed a song or two that were redone because the producers of the show weren't happy with the first version for some reason or another.

At the time of this concert, Waits was just about to release "Mule Variations," his first studio album in six years. It would come out two weeks later. Rolling Stone Magazine would later include it in their list of the top 500 albums of all time. A few songs were played from it: "Chocolate Jesus," "Get Behind the Mule," "Hold On," "Picture in a Frame," "House Where Nobody Lives," and "What's He Building." This is mostly performed in solo acoustic mode.

This album is an hour and 44 minutes long.

01 talk (Tom Waits)
02 Tango 'till They're Sore (Tom Waits)
03 talk (Tom Waits)
04 Hang Down Your Head (Tom Waits)
05 talk (Tom Waits)
06 Ol' 55 (Tom Waits)
07 talk (Tom Waits)
08 Strange Weather (Tom Waits)
09 talk (Tom Waits)
10 Hold On [False Start] (Tom Waits)
11 Hold On (Tom Waits)
12 talk (Tom Waits)
13 Picture in a Frame (Tom Waits)
14 talk (Tom Waits)
15 I Can't Wait to Get Off Work (Tom Waits)
16 talk (Tom Waits)
17 House Where Nobody Lives (Tom Waits)
18 Get Behind the Mule Intro (Tom Waits)
19 Get Behind the Mule (Tom Waits)
20 talk (Tom Waits)
21 Chocolate Jesus (Tom Waits)
22 talk (Tom Waits)
23 What's He Building (Tom Waits)
24 talk (Tom Waits)
25 A Little Rain (Tom Waits)
26 talk (Tom Waits)
27 Downtown Train (Tom Waits)
28 talk (Tom Waits)
29 Black Wings (Tom Waits)
30 talk (Tom Waits)
31 Jesus Gonna Be Here (Tom Waits)
32 talk (Tom Waits)
33 Jersey Girl (Tom Waits)

https://www.imagenetz.de/egFMe

alternate link:

https://pixeldrain.com/u/9Yg98Z61

The cover photo is from a concert at the South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas, on March 20, 1999, just a couple of weeks prior to this concert.